Values courses [comprising] eight teaching units [in total] have become mandatory in many German as a Second Language courses and above all in courses offered by the AMS. This article critically engages with the setting of values and their implicit evaluation in the context of the integration debate both in theory and in practice. What can adult education achieve in this area? Is it at all a suitable arena for courses on values? The author argues for values courses in the context of deliberate political education for civic education as a reaction to specific societal problems such as racism, intolerance, loss of culture, etc. The principles and guidelines for basic education could serve as an example for concrete political education. Finally, he calls for adult education to be a place of politically conscious, emancipatory education characterized above all by meeting on an equal footing, discursivity and a clear humanistic attitude. (DIPF/Orig.)